Katy Perry's anti-Trump message: 'Don't normalise hate'

By Jessica Rapana| 2 years ago

If there's one thing 2017 is teaching us, it's that a celeb, a platform and a political message can be a pretty powerful thing.

Less than a week after Hollywood veteran Meryl Streep delivered a crucifying speech about Donald Trump (and that time he mocked a disabled reporter), Katy Perry has released a video condemning the President-elect and his discussions about creating a Muslim registry.

The pop singer was the executive producer of a new public service announcement video, called "Don't normalise hate", which compares the idea of the registry to Japanese internment camps. In 1942, more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated in internment camps across the US.

Trump has previously advocated for a "total and complete shutdown" of Muslim immigration "until out country's representatives can figure out what is going on." Many believe he intends to implement a national registry of Muslim people in the United States. However, he has not confirmed or denied this since being elected.

In the video, an elderly woman tells the true story of 89-year-old Japanese-American Haru Kuromiya who was registered and placed in an internment camp for four years during the outbreak of World War II.

"We were an American farm family now living in an interment camp and our constitutional rights were taken away from us," she says on the video.

"It all started with fear and rumors then it bloomed into the registration of Japanese Americans and then labeling with physical tags and then eventually internment."

At the end of telling her story, the actress peels off her mask and reveals a Muslim-American woman Hina Khanm who tells viewers. "Don't let history repeat itself."

Perry posted the video on Twitter to her 95.3 million followers.

The video's director Aya Tanimura has since tweeted about the video, thanking Perry for coming on board. She said: "We all come together with the singular goal of making an artistic, emotional, real and honest statement that could start a discourse amongst people and elucidate the importance of being united given the current political climate."

Tanimura, a Japanese Australian filmmaker, added: "Let's start educating and understanding one another more in order to never allow history to repeat itself..."

She told the Los Angeles Times, Perry also financed the production, handing them a "blank check" to cover the costs of prosthetic materials for the custom-made mask.

"Katy has always been a champion of the underdog, of minorities, of the people who are kind of left of center, and she's become more politically involved in the last few election cycles," Tanimura said.